One Bright Summer Morning
- Автор: Чейз Джеймс Хэдли
- Год: 1963
- Язык: английский
- Год: Robert Hale
- Жанр: Криминальные детективы
Электронная книга - «One Bright Summer Morning». Краткое содержание книги:
Chita drew in a quick startled breath. She remained very still, staring at her brother who scowled at the burning end of his cigarette. He flicked the butt over the veranda rail and immediately lit another.
“Dead? What happened?”
“He was going to yell. He took me by surprise. I tapped him too hard,” Riff said, scowling. “I had the chain on. His goddam face busted like a dropped egg.”
Chita wiped her sweating hands on the skirt of her dress. Her quick, animal intelligence told her at once that now they were in real trouble. Steadying her voice, she said, “What have you done with him?”
“Buried him out there.” Riff pointed to the sand dunes.
“If they ever find out he’s dead,” Chita said slowly, “Kramer won’t be able to keep the cops out of this.”
“Think I’m dumb?” Riff snarled. “I’ve thought of that. I tell you it wasn’t my fault! I just hit him too hard.”
For a long moment, Chita fought against a rising panic, Kidnapping! Now murder!
“You’ll have to take food to the cabin every day,” she said finally. “Suppose you tell Zegetti that the yellow-skin had seen you, but there’s no need for him to see him or me. The less faces he sees the safer for us all. Zegetti will fall for that line. That’ll give us a couple of days to see how it works out.”
Riff thought about this. It made sense to him and he nodded.
“But I don’t see how we fix it in the end,” he said. “The punk’s dead and I killed him.”
“I’ll think about it,” Chita said. “Could be we could push the killing on to Zegetti. The cops know him. They don’t know us.”
“Oh, wrap up!” Riff snarled. “They’ll know when he sparked out. Moe wasn’t here until fifteen hours after I hit the punk. These cops are smart.”
“I’ll think about it,” Chita said again. She paused, then, “Riff... leave that girl alone.”
Riff stared at her, his narrow eyes glittering.
“I’m fixing her good,” he said viciously. “No — talks that way to me! You keep out of it! I’m going to fix her and I’ll fix her good!”
Chita got to her feet.
“You touch her and you’ll be sorry,” she said. “You want to use your head. We’re in bad trouble enough now, but if you interfere with her, we’ll be up to the neck in it. Can’t you see... we’re in real trouble already?” It was typical of the Cranes to share the responsibility of each other’s mistakes. “Get your mind off her. What is she anyway? All she has is a fat behind... nothing else. You start thinking about the yellow-skin. I want to leave here with ten thousand dollars which I can spend!”
She went away, leaving Riff scowling out across the moonlit desert.
Vic and Carrie lay side by side in one of the single beds in their bedroom. Carrie wanted to be as close as she could get to her husband. The cot in which Junior slept peacefully had been moved to within arm’s reach of the bed.
Neither of them had been able to sleep. Carrie began again on the subject they had already discussed and discussed.
“You can’t do it, Vic,” she said. “You can’t act as this man’s go-between. You can surely see that, can’t you?”
Vic moved impatiently.
“I don’t give a damn about the Van Wylies,” he said, pulling her close to him. “I have to do it for our sakes. He wasn’t bluffing. Carrie... I’m pretty sure Di-Long’s dead.”
Carrie stiffened.
“Oh, no!”
“Well, if he isn’t dead, then he’s badly hurt. I picked that blood up on my shoe in his cabin. That thug hits!” He touched his aching face. “If he hit Di-Long...”
“Don’t Vic!”
“These people mean business. I don’t know who the fat man is, but you can see for yourself, he is just as big a thug as the young one. If I don’t do what he says, he could take it out of you and Junior. He’s not bluffing. I have to do it.”
“But, Vic, you aren’t going to leave me alone with them?” Carrie said, her voice jumping a note.
“They aren’t looking for trouble,” Vic said quietly. “They only want the money. They won’t harm you... unless I fail to get the money for them. I’m sure of that.”
“I wish I was as sure. You really mean you’re going off tomorrow and leave me with these awful people?”
Vic drew in a long, slow breath.
“Unless you have another suggestion, Carrie, that’s what I have to do.”
“Suggestion? What do you mean?”
“What else do you want me to do?”
“I keep telling you! Stay here with Junior and me of course!”
“You want me to tell that man I won’t do what he asks?” Vic said quietly.
They were back where they had started. They had gone over this again and again. Vic understood how Carrie felt to be left alone with these thugs, but he realized that if she and Junior were to remain safe there was no other alternative.
“I have to go, darling,” he said.
Carrie closed her eyes. She clung closer to him, fighting back the tears that tried to escape through her tightly closed eyelids.
Moe Zegetti lay in the comfortable bed in the fourth guest room. Although he hadn’t been so comfortable in years, his mind was uneasy. He was thinking of his mother. It was now two weeks since he had seen her. He had had no news of her since he had left Frisco. He knew she was pretty bad, but he had great faith in her toughness. When this job was over, he would be worth a quarter of a million dollars! Big Jim had said so and when Big Jim made a promise, he stuck to it. With that kind of money, Moe told himself, no matter how bad his mother was, he would be able to fix anything for her.
But he hadn’t the money as yet. He worried about the speed cop. He worried too about Riff Crane. That boy was bad... really bad. Moe didn’t like the way he had looked at the Van Wylie girl. There was trouble ahead with those two: he was sure of that. And Riff had Dermott’s gun. That was bad. A punk like Riff with his kind of nature should never have a gun.
In the room next to Moe’s, Zelda lay awake. She wondered what her father was doing right at this very moment. She moved her long legs under the sheet and smiled into the moonlit shadows. He must be laying square eggs, she thought. She had no doubt he would pay up and pay up fast. Really it was a pity that it would be over so soon for she was frankly enjoying herself. The first moment of shock when that girl had squirted acid on the Jag door and she had seen the way the leather had just peeled away had terrified her, but once she was over the shock and she realized she was in no danger, this affair had begun to amuse and excite her. After all, she was in luxury. No one could complain about the room in which she was. Then there was this man with the scarred face. Zelda felt a hot rush of blood through her at the thought of him. He was an animal, but what an animal!
Her hands went under the sheet and she closed her eyes. The image of Riff filled her mind. She began to breathe unevenly and heavily: soon she was panting, her legs tightly pressed together. Later still, she fell asleep.
Chapter Seven
Kramer sat in a lounging chair, a cigar gripped between his teeth. Behind him stood Moe Zegetti. Opposite him, in another lounging chair, sat Vic Dermott.
From where he sat, Vic could see through the window across the patio to the garage. The garage doors were open. Riff was working on Vic’s Cadillac. He had already replaced the sparking plugs. He was now removing the licence plates and replacing them with plates Kramer had brought with him.
The time was some minutes after nine o’clock.
Kramer said, “You’ll reach Van Wylie’s place around eleven o’clock. You know what to say. You have to convince him that if he doesn’t pay up without fuss he’ll never see his daughter again. I’m not fooling. If something turns sour, I’ll bow out and leave you all to the Cranes. Understand?”